Last year, Andrea Rosso was searching for novel ways to promote his family’s winery, Mankas Hills Vineyard of Fairfield, Calif. Having just released a new blend of cabernet sauvignon and merlot in 2004, the Rossos needed a quick, effective way to spread word as far and as wide as possible.
When Rosso finally settled on a strategy that mixed direct mail and the Web, he decided against simply building his own Internet site, as some competitors were content to do. Instead, he turned to others’ sites – enlisting wine bloggers nationwide to help him promote the wine, which he named Amelie after his daughter. Thus began the “Amelie 2004 for Bloggers” program, which became so popular that tasting samples of Mankas Hills wine (along with a promotional letter and tasting notes) were soon going to any adult blogger who requested it – regardless of the blog’s subject matter.
The program became a hit, and Rosso says that his willingness to venture beyond just wine blogs – an unorthodox marketing practice few other vineyards have attempted – introduced Mankas Hills to broad and diverse audiences.
Rosso estimates that he mailed out about 100 Mankas Hills packages to bloggers – all participants were 21 years old or older – who asked for the wine, assuring them that they didn’t have to write about the wine unless they wanted to. “It got onto some other blogs on other topics, such as politics,” says Rosso. “It started getting onto MySpace and LiveJournal and then it really spread out to other communities.” Ultimately, Rosso says, the program raised the brand’s profile and boosted sales by 100 percent before it ended in September 2006.
Still, for all the success that companies like Mankas Hills Vineyards have had with bloggers, there are also plenty of brands that have stumbled in their own attempts. Take, for example, the case of the near-ubiquitous computer and software manufacturer that mailed out laptops featuring its new operating system to bloggers, only to be accused of bald-faced attempts to manipulate them. The big brand’s blunder was spectacular, the message from the blogsophere unmistakable: Play at your own risk because norms that apply to old-school journalists may not count here.
Influential bloggers, like reporters, don’t appreciate any perception that they can be bribed. Though most bloggers are not trained journalists, they still tend to feel the only obligation they owe is to their audience. So while they may very well accept a free product – unlike their newspaper and magazine counterparts, who are generally strictly prohibited from accepting gifts from story sources or subjects – they may still ignore, or even trash, the product on their sites.
Pages: 1 2 Brand Marketing, Large Business, Medium Business, Social Media
